Despite decades of commercial availability of a wide variety of transvaginally placed uterine manipulators, the need still exists for more effective and ergonomic surgical instruments to optimize the remote manipulation of a patient's vaginal, cervical and uterine tissues during modern minimally invasive gynecologic procedures. Naturally occurring openings in the body, like the vagina, urethra, anus and mouth, provide places to engage internal tissues without the requirement of cutting a hole in the patient's skin. Utilization of the vaginal canal to surgically access the cervix and uterus is routinely part of modern health care. As major gynecologic therapeutic interventions continue to become less invasive using fewer and smaller incisions, without better means for uterine control and mobilization, such procedures will become increasingly difficult to perform and require substantially more operative time, while potentially compromising patient safety and clinical outcomes. Extensive research has led to the invention and development of this new technology for uterine manipulation to address this critical unmet clinical need in women's health care.